NEW YORK (VINnews) — The director of the United Nations’ World Food Programme, David Beasly claimed on CNN that a small group of US billionaires could solve the current problems of world hunger with just a fraction of their net worth.
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Beasley spoke on CNN and said that the current situation is a “perfect storm” of several crises, such as climate change and the Covid-19 pandemic, mean many nations are “knocking on famine’s door.”
Beasley said that the WFO needs immediately “$6 billion to help 42 million people that are literally going to die if we don’t reach them. It’s not complicated,” he added.
Half of the population of Afghanistan — 22.8 million people — face an acute hunger crisis, according to a WFP report released Monday. Rampant unemployment and a liquidity crisis means the country is teetering on the edge of a humanitarian crisis and 3.2 million children under the age of five are at risk, the report concluded.
Climate change is another concern for Beasley, since it affects many countries’ food baskets.
“For example, take the United States and the region in Central America, the Dry Corridor, Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador and Nicaragua — just down in that area alone,” said Beasley Tuesday. “We’re feeding a lot of people down there and the climate is just changing with hurricanes and flash flooding; it’s just devastating.”
In Ethiopia, the WFP estimates that 5.2 million people are in urgent need of food assistance in the Tigray region, where Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has led a major offensive against the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) since last year. Thousands of civilians have since been killed, while more than 2 million have been displaced.
“I don’t know where they’re getting the food from,” said Beasley in the wide-ranging interview. “We’re out of fuel. We’re out of cash, in terms of paying our people and we are running out of money and we can’t get our trucks in.”
Beasley challenged the US billionaires to “step up” for a “one time” assistance to help address the immediate crisis. He says that $6.6B right now can save 42 million lives and remarked that this is less than 2% of Elon Musk’s fortune. (currently worth about 292 billion dollars). CNN published this challenge, headlining it: “2% of Elon Musk’s wealth could solve world hunger.”
Beasley was challenged on his assertions by Dr. Eli Ben-David, a leading AI expert at Bar Ilan university. Ben-David said that last year the UN World Food Program (WFP) raised $8.4B. How come it didn’t “solve world hunger”?
At the same time, Elon Musk himself responded on Twitter to Beasley’s challenge, stating that “If WFP can describe on this Twitter thread exactly how $6B will solve world hunger, I will sell Tesla stock right now and do it.” However Musk added a caveat: “But it must be open source accounting, so the public sees precisely how the money is spent.”
If WFP can describe on this Twitter thread exactly how $6B will solve world hunger, I will sell Tesla stock right now and do it.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 31, 2021
Beasley responded that he had never said the money would “solve world hunger”, stating that “this is a one-time donation to save 42 million lives during this unprecedented hunger crisis.”
As soon as Misk told him it need to be open source accounting hr changed his tune. Beasley said he never said that yet he didn’t challenge CNN’s headline. Part of the issue may just be that not all the money raised goes forward hunger. Remember he remained 8.4 billion last year…. If he wants these billionaires to step up , he should open his books
Theoretically, $6B could save 42 million lives is . In practice, it wouldn’t save any. “Beasley said that the WFO needs immediately “$6 billion to help 42 million people that are literally going to die if we don’t reach them. It’s not complicated.”
Unfortunately, it is complicated.
Taking just 1 example; in Afghanistan, the Taliban control the country. Any money or supplies would be taken by them (either the Taliban leaders, or individual Same situation in Ethiopia.
IMAGINE- the billionaire$ donating 2% of their wealth to end the current hunger crisis. 2% !
At least Bill Gates donates a portion of his absurd wealth to humanitarian programs, mostly to vaccines and health projects.
If Musk gave away 99% of his wealth, he’d still have over three billion dollars left. I don’t think he needs to worry about going hungry.
if you divide $6 billion between 42 million people everyone gets $142.85 how exactly will a that solve poverty amongst them?
Musk’s worth is based off the stock price of Tesla. If hypothetically speaking, Elon Musk decides to liqudate everything for cash, I doubt he could get more than 25% of his net worth (since the stock price would drop dramatically, due to his selling ownership). Now you can argue that, 25% of his net worth is still plenty of money, which can save hundreds of livres. I hope anyone here would realize that’s a stupid argument, since all of Musk’s companies would come to an end.
So he back tracks. And exactly how will he get food fo Afghanistan? You think it will all go to the poor vs corruption. Once they throw in climate garbage we know it’s fake